Maybe,but after watching the HK games and the Huddersfield match, I'm not convinced he's a Premier League centre half. I understand he can get away with it in the Dutch League , which is about a competitive as the Scottish top division, but I think De Boer has - like overseas managers before him - seriously underestimated the rigours of the Premier League. It has skill, but is also fast and pretty brutal. I still think he'll either be gone by New Year, or we're in real danger of going down.
I'm back to hoping there are three worse teams.....

We need a leader to organize the back line that would give Riedewald half a chance. Dann as the senior man should be the one who grasps the nettle.

So after the games in Hong Kong you aren't convinced he is a premier league centre back. You mean those two games he didn't play in because he was in England signing his deal?

The key to me is the central defender of the three. Jairo and TFM will grow as a unit with a strong leader between them. Sakho would be perfect for that. Scott Dann is not. We saw last season as captain and against Huddersfield, he is not vocal enough, he is not controlling that back line. He also sadly repeatedly shows that he is not the quality he once was and looks vulnerable.

He didn't play in HK - assume you mean Metz where he got 45 mins or Schalke? Thought he played OK in those matches.

As we saw last year, Dann is not a natural leader. Him next to 20 and 19 year olds with pretty much zero Premier League experience, in a formation and role that he's not used to, is asking way too much. Especially when we have Tomkins, a proven premier league CB with over 200 appearances under his belt, sitting on the bench. Both arrogant and naive of De Boer IMHO.

The boos for a backpass were after about 15 mins

To play him Mensah and RLC on the first day was a bad move imo, but to boo tje bloke was poor from the self proclaimed best home support in the league

Indeed, the fans were putting pressure on the passes at the back at 0-0. It doesn't help. It's also slightly ridiculous.

Agreed

Only boos heard in the Whitehorse was when at 3 nil down Jairo played a back pass after turning back and not being under pressure

Also, no slight on the much maligned Hennessey as it's not his game, but what is the point of 'the best passer in dutch football' knocking it back 40 yards to one of the worst goalkeepers at distributing the ball? Hardly playing to the team's strengths is it.

Yes, sorry. At the very least, I don't think he's ready for this division yet.
Certainly not as part of that particular three at the back. They looked less than convincing together, and he looked liked the weakest link to me.
Ignore me on the HK games - I was in hospital and drugged up to the eyeballs while watching those.... :(

I think his performance on Saturday is certainly a worry. Funds appear to be limited this window and he is our biggest outlay by far and only permanent transfer so far.

And after just looking back at the game again, he really was close to awful. Hopefully it is not just FDB who will learn from Saturday, it will have been a chastening debut for Riedewald too. I'm not writing him of at all but it was certainly a very poor debut.

The booing backwards passes needs to stop asap, the bloke's 20 ffs. Would you boo Kaikai or Dreher if they did the same?

Completely agree with that.

No prob with not booing JR, yet, but the comparison with the other players is misleading because they didn't cost £8m+

I remember two occasions when we tried to pasd from the back.

The first was the Dowie years and I think it was our first game back in the Premier League - Fitz Hall was playing - and the booing happened within seconds. People were shouting "Forward! Forward!".

The second was when we were playing Swansea under Holloway and we got played off the park.

To be honest some have this obsession that we must play with Two wide players, which was excellent whilst Zaha and Bolasie were tearing defences apart, but that is no longer the case even with Townsend as replacement. If we had Central midfielders who were able to pick an accurate pass to play in the wide men it would be effective, but we don't unfortunately, so it needs another approach to make the team more effective.
Just look at our results to realise the system leaves us open, also take a look at the Top Six teams to see if they play with genuine wingers, they simply use Wing Backs in some cases, or with a more compact midfield playing short passing which gives a better balance.
Whilst we continue to play with a "novice" Back Three as we saw on Saturday and get opened up so easily, and with the so called Wing Backs of Ward and Van Arnholt seemingly "lost" and leaving spaces that were exploited easily as we saw for the 2nd goal when Mooy left Ward (not with pace) but clever movement and crossed for the headed goal.
My reasoning for the system i chose is it makes us more of a solid unit, with Luka sweeping up in front of the Back Three to provide stability and cut out the spaces, but also as a link with the Midfield to provide them with short simple passes that don't keep going astray. Finally with a Front Three of Zaha-Benteke -Van Persie which for a change would then make us a goal threat, but the formation can also be flexible if need be into allowing Zaha a wandering "free winger" role to cause mayhem and much harder to mark, and with say RVP playing just behind where he can be deadly or alongside CB, or Benteke as the lone striker.
If we choose to play without Wide players, then it simply means adapting and playing more of a short passing game and balls to feet as we see with the Top teams, or some lower teams like Bournemouth, Leicester etc etc.
The dream of having terrifying Wingers that was effective disappeared when YB left, so we now need to re-adjust accordingly if we are to stop being defensively exploited as easily as we do currently, Big Sam saw the reason for a change and we know how effective it proved to be.

Wilf, Benteke etc wouldn't get grief for doing it either.

Think the difficulty with the backpasses were the fans were thinking counterattack, break and get forward whereas Reidewald was thinking let's take our time and be patient. Be interesting to see if the 2 cultures can meld into something better...

Absolutely agree. I thought Dann's leadership and organising was very poor. He's the one who should be taking most the grief for our defensive performance.